ProBlogger: How Compassion International Uses Blogging to Save Lives

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How Compassion International Uses Blogging to Save Lives Posted: 26 Feb 2015 06:06 AM PST This is a guest contribution from Caitlin Gustafson.I imagine a dirt road with boys playing with a lonely old soccer ball in the warm sunshine. A little boy with dark brown curls chases the ball, his worn sneakers kicking up dust from the street. I don't know if that's what life is really like for Janair, my sponsor child from Honduras. But every time I get a hand-written letter in crayon, or I see a new picture of him, it's what I imagine. Compassion International is a non-profit organization that works in 26 countries around the world and is one of the few organizations that holds a 4-star rating from CharityNavigator. Compassion was doing content marketing before it was in vogue and they consistently outperform other similar non-profits in their efforts. Though Compassion International uses many methods of content marketing, including video, Pinterest, direct mail, and email, a huge part of their success is tied to blogging. According to Content Marketing Institute, 61% of Non-Profit marketers use content marketing, but only 35% say their efforts are effective. I'd venture a guess that the marketing team at Compassion International is within that 35%. Company Blog Every few days, Compassion International posts new stories to their blog. Some are communicated from field specialists, those who work directly with sponsored children and world relief projects. These are stories of heartbreak and hope for a brighter future. Some are inspirational pieces written to encourage sponsors to have more involved relationships with their sponsored children. Other stories are written by sponsored children who have overcome poverty through Compassion programs. Occasionally you will hear from a sponsor who tells how their involvement in Compassion has changed their life. What makes the blog so engaging is how they manage to tell a story in each update. All of these are all personalized stories from people directly involved in their relief programs. They aren't lists of ways to alleviate poverty, and individual blog posts aren't likely to rank for any keywords in a Google search. Somehow I doubt ranking for specific keywords is the intent with this blog. Instead, it's a compelling collection of stories that keeps readers coming back, engaged, and committed to Compassion's relief efforts.   A Network of Bloggers Not only does Compassion keep an active blog that gets great engagement on social media and more, they have a network of over 350 affiliate bloggers to amplify their message to new audiences. Some of these bloggers are big names with lots of followers, such as author Ann Voskamp, or popular musical artist Shaun Groves. Compassion offers monthly assignments or writing prompts that bloggers can incorporate into their content calendars if they so choose. Through this program each blogger is given a sponsor affiliate code and they can track how many children are sponsored through the links they use on their website. It's a different rewards program than many affiliate networks, which reward bloggers with commissions or free product based on sales. Instead, this rewards program directly benefits the blogger's sponsor child through family gifts that help impoverished families buy extra food, clothes, chickens, etc.   International Blogger Trips Every so often, Compassion takes groups of sponsors overseas to meet the children they support. Bloggers often come on these trips and write about their experiences and encourage others to sign up and sponsor their own children using affiliate links. Myquillyn Smith from Nesting Place and Christy Jordan from Southern Plate are two popular bloggers that have taken part in such trips. Their stories have inspired many readers to sponsor their own children through Compassion International.   What Does This Mean For Me? As a blogger, your website might not be dedicated to AIDS relief or ending poverty. So if you're wondering how you can translate Compassion's blogging success to your financial planning site, here's my suggestion: readers want stories. It's never been clearer that the most successful brands, advertisements, and blogs are the ones that tell a story. Ikea Spain's Holiday commercial last year wasn't about their furniture. It was about families and togetherness over the Holidays, and told as a story. Lifestyle bloggers like Joy Cho, Joanna Goddard, and Kendi Skeen are popular because they connect with their readers through stories. KendiEveryday is a style blog – but readers love when she talks about her business ventures into opening her own clothing boutique. OhJoy is a mommy blogger that connects with readers by incorporating her recent pregnancy story into her regular blog content, like her "how to dress the bump" in each month of her pregnancy. A blog about financial planning can be exciting if you can use it to tell readers how you got into the business of stocks and IRAs. Could you tell a client's success story? Incorporating these stories into your regular blog content can only benefit your blog in the long run as it builds that personal relationship with your readers. Caitlin Gustafson is an Online PR Specialist for Web Talent Marketing with a focus on content marketing and social media. You can find her blogging and tweeting about her two favorite things: digital marketing and travel. Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger How Compassion International Uses Blogging to Save Lives

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ProBlogger: Are You a Full Time Blogger with Small to Medium Traffic? Let’s Chat

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Are You a Full Time Blogger with Small to Medium Traffic? Let’s Chat Posted: 25 Feb 2015 06:15 AM PST One of the biggest misconceptions that many bloggers have is that you need MASSIVE traffic to become a full time blogger. We often hear how many hundreds of thousands or even millions of visitors this or that blog has but the reality is that I’ve met many bloggers over the years who don’t have massive traffic – yet who are still making a healthy income from their blogging. The problem is that these bloggers don’t always have the platform to tell their stories and so the myth that you need massive traffic goes on without being busted. This year I want to smash that myth and want to tell the stories of smaller to medium sized bloggers who are making a living from their blogs. If you’re a full time (or close to full time) blogger and would consider yourself to be in the small to medium category – I’ve love to hear a little about you and your blog and have set up a form to help gather your stories. I can’t guarantee to tell everyone’s story (I’ve already had 80 responses) but I would love to hear it. I’m looking for as many models of making money blogging as I can find. So whether you’re doing it through some kind of advertising or sponsorship or by selling an eProduct or membership or even if you’re using a blog to sell your services or to promote a brick and mortar business – I’d love to hear from you. Note: I’m particularly looking for blogs that are NOT about making money online. While that’s a legit niche I got a load of those in previous submissions. I’d much prefer to hear from blogs who blog about fashion, travel, food, business, health, fitness, parenting, life… not making money. Sorry if that excludes you but looking for other niches right now. Here’s the form for you to submit your details PS: a few people have asked what I would classify ‘small to medium traffic’ as. While I’m open to your interpretation on that the examples that I’ve got so far that interest me the most are from people who have traffic from as little as 600 visitors a month (really, there are a couple of great examples) up to 20,000 to 30,000 per month (or 1000 or so per day). Having said that – I’m open to hearing all kinds of stories! Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger Are You a Full Time Blogger with Small to Medium Traffic? Let’s Chat

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How to Create Ridiculously Good Content – Interview with Ann Handley - DailyBlogTips

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How to Create Ridiculously Good Content – Interview with Ann Handley Posted: 24 Feb 2015 07:33 AM PST Ann Handley is a best-selling author, keynote speaker and the world's first Chief Content Officer. Named the most influential woman in Social Media by Forbes, she is a monthly columnist for Entrepreneur magazine and a member of the LinkedIn Influencer program. While researching the Top 25 Social Media Marketing Books to Read in 2015 I came across Ann's latest book, Everybody Writes, a Wall Street Journal bestseller, which obviously made the cut. Everybody Writes is your go-to guide to creating ridiculously good content. Ann was kind enough to chat with me about how we are all writers and how to create killer content. You say that in today's content-driven world, writing matters more… not less. Why? Because we are all publishers. If you have a website, you're a publisher. If you are on social media, you are in marketing. Our story is what connects our customers to us. We are all writers but that doesn't mean we are all GOOD writers. How do we become good writers and does it take a journalism degree to do so? No it doesn't require a journalism degree. Many of us have a complicated relationship with writing – very often based on some trauma in childhood when we internalized an idea that we weren't "writers." But with some general, relevant knowledge and basic tools, we can all be good writers. Some of us can even be great. One key thing is to take pressure off yourself to write any certain way – there is no one way to write, just as there is no one way to raise a child or roast a turkey. (But there are terrible ways to do all three!) You've stated that besides writing skills content marketers should have an amateur's passion. Can you expand on this and what other qualities should great content marketers have and why? The root of the word "amateur" is the Latin "to love." You have to love creating content – would you create content even if it you didn't get paid to do so? I also think that a curiosity about people and how the world works is key. And then, a love for teaching and sharing what you find with others. Life is confusing. So is business, and products – especially in the B2B space. The best content marketers I've ever met have a need to figure out how to make the world simpler, better, more understandable. As my former journalism school professor would say, "No one will complain that you made things too simple to understand." The online world and digital marketing are constantly changing and changing rapidly. What's your advice for companies to stay relevant? Keep talking to your customers. Answer their questions. Be a resource to them. Provide value. That's the best way to stay current. More generally, too, find a resource to keep you on top of marketing news and development. That might be MarketingProfs.com. Or it might be something else. What matters is that you find a resource you can consistently rely on. As traditional marketing techniques are no longer enough, for those companies still living under a rock, how do they get started online and is there time to catch up? Sure there is. Plan a blog. But first, find your content marketing mission: Ask yourself: What do we stand for? For example, the New York Public Library says it is "on a mission to inspire lifelong learning, advance knowledge, and strengthen communities." Then, use that to craft your content strategy and voice, and identify key themes that you can "own," for lack of a better word. You can see how the NYPL does that on its wildly popular Instagram feed. It's all about inspiring people to connect with a mission. Your best content is not about what you do or what you sell – but what you do for others. Good content doesn't happen in a vacuum. It has everything to do with the experience you are creating for those you serve. Does that sound high-minded? It's really not – it's about getting comfortable embracing what makes your organization unique. What is your favorite social media network for content marketing? For business: blogs. For personal use: Instagram. Wanna learn how to make more money with your website? Check the Online Profits training program!

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“Top 15 FREE Internet Marketing Tools To Boost Your Online Business” plus 1 more

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Top 15 FREE Internet Marketing Tools To Boost Your Online Business Posted: 24 Feb 2015 06:26 AM PST This is a guest contribution from Kulwat Nagi. Today, Internet marketing is evolving at a greater pace than ever. Companies are pulling out all the stops to get more online exposure and, eventually, more customers. Using premium services for all the tools necessary for Internet marketing is not feasible for every business – that's when free options come into play. When I started my career two years ago, I was not aware of these tools, so I kept looking for the best and easiest ways to boost my business. I continued to add all the tools to my browser's bookmarks for quick & easy access. If you are one of the Internet marketers who is still banging their head against a brick wall to find free tools that can help you save your time, boost your productivity and ultimately bring some favorable results, then stay tuned for another 5–10 minutes.  Here I am going to reveal 15 Internet marketing tools which I am personally using and getting huge benefits from. 15 Free Tools to Help Your Online Business 1. Content Idea Generator  Being an Internet marketer, I can understand how difficult it is to come up with a great idea. Having writer's block is one of the biggest enemies for all the Internet marketers. When that's the case, you can use this idea generator tool, which offers tons of creative ideas. 2. Pocket I am deeply in love with this tool :) Such a killer innovation that makes it possible to enjoy articles anywhere in the world. Pocket can be added as an extension on any browser or downloaded as an app for all smart phones. You can install this app in your browser and save articles for future reading. All the saved articles can be accessed at a later time. The app not only enables you to read articles, but also makes a great repository for all the best articles in the world. The articles you save using the Pocket app will be logged in your account and you can access them anytime you want. Here is a screenshot of my pocket app: 3. BufferApp This is great service for sharing your content on various social media websites. You can easily schedule your content on various social media and site and populate your content very simply, all from one dashboard. 4. HootSuite If we talk about social media management, HootSuite grabs the top position on the list. This little tool helps you manage all your social media activities from one dashboard.  You can schedule your tweets, Facebook status updates, Google+ shares and various other awesome things which are only limited by your imagination! 5. Backlinks Checker Moz and SEMRush are the best tools to use to check backlinks for any website. Although they offer only a few searches for free members, you can still find your competitors' backlinks very easily. 6. Keyword Niche Finder  Keyword Niche Finder is an awesome and easy-to-use software. It will let you come up with most profitable keyword(s) in your niche. The tool will categorise your keywords according to different niches and will provide you with keyword suggestions for different niches of your keyword. 7. After the Deadline This is a Chrome extension which will let you check spelling, style and grammar. It will check your spelling in real time, so you'll never make the same mistakes again. Note: If you are a WordPress user, you can download this plugin here.  8. Loading Speed Testing Tools I love Google page speed and GTMetrix. Both tools analyse websites to determine the loading time on your blog. Google gives priority to fast-loading blogs, so these tools will show opportunity areas on your blog to improve the loading time. After following suggestions given by these tools, you can improve your blog's loading time dramatically. See my blog's speed here: Small SEO Tools Small SEO Tools is the best site I've come across in my blogging career. They have included some of the best tools, free of cost. I personally use this site daily for different tasks. They have tools like:  Plagiarism checker Article rewriter Keyword position Google PageRank checker Backlink checker Online ping tool Alexa rank checker Domain IP lookup Keyword suggestion tool Page speed checker tool and at least 30 more tools to make your life easier. 10. Google Drive and Dropbox I cannot imagine blogging without the help of Google Drive and Dropbox (As a matter of fact, I wrote this article on Google docs). Both are easy-to-use online tools where you can save your most important files and access them in any part of the world. Google Drive continuously saves your data while you are still preparing a document so there is no need to worry if there is any interruption, like computer hangs or shutdown. Dropbox gives you 2GB space when you join. By referring your online buddies, you can get an additional 20GB of space at no cost. 11. Audacity If you love to create podcasts on your blog or are thinking about starting to create them, then this is one of the must-have tools for you.  Audacity comes with a fantastic interface which helps you to mix your audio files, cut down little portions, adjust volume and many other little tweaks to make your audio file more professional. 12. Email marketing software MailChimp, Mam Mimi and Ininbox are three free tools which you can use to build subscribers on your blog. They allow you to add a good number of subscribers, free of cost. They each have different tools that you can customise to your needs. 13. PhotoPin More than 60 percent of images on my blog have been downloaded from PhotoPin. Photopin fetches free images from Flickr, which makes a great collection. In the search results, the first 10-15 images will be sponsored images, so you can skip those images and choose the appropriate images from the rest of the collection for your blog post. 14. StatCounter A killer alternative to Google Analytics, StatCounter will track each and every activity on your blog, like the source of recent visits, recent keywords, visitor’s location, visitor's country, exit links, visit length, returning visits and many more awesome features that allow you to keep close tabs on your visitors. You will get few lines of code which you can add to your blog and start tracking your visitors right away. 15. Asana Asana is a teamwork management software which was primarily designed for internal email circulation at Facebook headquarters. But soon after that, they launched it to the open market and made it free to use. Asana lets you assign tasks to your team members and keeps you informed about their activities. As soon as they finish the task assigned to them, you will get an email notification. This will not only help you to track your progress, but you will also be able to manage your team's tasks very efficiently.  Kulwant Nagi is an Internet marketing expert. He writes at BloggingCage.com where he shares blogging and SEO tips to help you make your blogging career awesome.   Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger Top 15 FREE Internet Marketing Tools To Boost Your Online Business

Why You Should Join us at the next ProBlogger Training Event Posted: 24 Feb 2015 06:13 AM PST Have you ever considered coming to a ProBlogger training event? We hear from a lot of bloggers around Australia (and internationally) that they’ve thought about it but were a little unsure if it was for them. So at last year’s event we filmed this little video with the help of our mate Mick Russell to give you a feel for the event, our attendees and why they think you should join us at our 2015 event. In the lead up to tickets being launched on 19 March we’ve begun to make announcements about what is happening at this year’s event. Here’s what you need to know: Dates: 14-15 August Venue: RACV Royal Pines Resort on the Gold Coast (Queensland Australia) Cost: $399 AUD (that’s currently $311 USD) Includes: two full days of training, recordings/slides of all sessions, lunch and refreshments both days and entry to our Friday night networking event. We’ve also started announcing some of our speakers. So far there’s Heather B Armstrong from Dooce, and Pamela Wilson from Copyblogger and Big Brand Systems. Of course as usual I’ll also be speaking and we’ll be announcing more speakers as we get closer to tickets going on sale on 19 March. There are a few more details over on our event page (including information on accommodation and flights). If you’re interested in coming along make sure you’re signed up to receive our email alerts: Subscribe to our mailing list Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger Why You Should Join us at the next ProBlogger Training Event

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ProBlogger: How Compassion International Uses Blogging to Save Lives

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How Compassion International Uses Blogging to Save Lives Posted: 12 Feb 2015 04:06 PM PST This is a guest contribution from Caitlin Gustafson.I imagine a dirt road with boys playing with a lonely old soccer ball in the warm sunshine. A little boy with dark brown curls chases the ball, his worn sneakers kicking up dust from the street. I don't know if that's what life is really like for Janair, my sponsor child from Honduras. But every time I get a hand-written letter in crayon, or I see a new picture of him, it's what I imagine. Compassion International is a non-profit organization that works in 26 countries around the world and is one of the few organizations that holds a 4-star rating from CharityNavigator. Compassion was doing content marketing before it was in vogue and they consistently outperform other similar non-profits in their efforts. Though Compassion International uses many methods of content marketing, including video, Pinterest, direct mail, and email, a huge part of their success is tied to blogging. According to Content Marketing Institute, 61% of Non-Profit marketers use content marketing, but only 35% say their efforts are effective. I'd venture a guess that the marketing team at Compassion International is within that 35%. Company Blog Every few days, Compassion International posts new stories to their blog. Some are communicated from field specialists, those who work directly with sponsored children and world relief projects. These are stories of heartbreak and hope for a brighter future. Some are inspirational pieces written to encourage sponsors to have more involved relationships with their sponsored children. Other stories are written by sponsored children who have overcome poverty through Compassion programs. Occasionally you will hear from a sponsor who tells how their involvement in Compassion has changed their life. What makes the blog so engaging is how they manage to tell a story in each update. All of these are all personalized stories from people directly involved in their relief programs. They aren't lists of ways to alleviate poverty, and individual blog posts aren't likely to rank for any keywords in a Google search. Somehow I doubt ranking for specific keywords is the intent with this blog. Instead, it's a compelling collection of stories that keeps readers coming back, engaged, and committed to Compassion's relief efforts.   A Network of Bloggers Not only does Compassion keep an active blog that gets great engagement on social media and more, they have a network of over 350 affiliate bloggers to amplify their message to new audiences. Some of these bloggers are big names with lots of followers, such as author Ann Voskamp, or popular musical artist Shaun Groves. Compassion offers monthly assignments or writing prompts that bloggers can incorporate into their content calendars if they so choose. Through this program each blogger is given a sponsor affiliate code and they can track how many children are sponsored through the links they use on their website. It's a different rewards program than many affiliate networks, which reward bloggers with commissions or free product based on sales. Instead, this rewards program directly benefits the blogger's sponsor child through family gifts that help impoverished families buy extra food, clothes, chickens, etc.   International Blogger Trips Every so often, Compassion takes groups of sponsors overseas to meet the children they support. Bloggers often come on these trips and write about their experiences and encourage others to sign up and sponsor their own children using affiliate links. Myquillyn Smith from Nesting Place and Christy Jordan from Southern Plate are two popular bloggers that have taken part in such trips. Their stories have inspired many readers to sponsor their own children through Compassion International.   What Does This Mean For Me? As a blogger, your website might not be dedicated to AIDS relief or ending poverty. So if you're wondering how you can translate Compassion's blogging success to your financial planning site, here's my suggestion: readers want stories. It's never been clearer that the most successful brands, advertisements, and blogs are the ones that tell a story. Ikea Spain's Holiday commercial last year wasn't about their furniture. It was about families and togetherness over the Holidays, and told as a story. Lifestyle bloggers like Joy Cho, Joanna Goddard, and Kendi Skeen are popular because they connect with their readers through stories. KendiEveryday is a style blog – but readers love when she talks about her business ventures into opening her own clothing boutique. OhJoy is a mommy blogger that connects with readers by incorporating her recent pregnancy story into her regular blog content, like her "how to dress the bump" in each month of her pregnancy. A blog about financial planning can be exciting if you can use it to tell readers how you got into the business of stocks and IRAs. Could you tell a client's success story? Incorporating these stories into your regular blog content can only benefit your blog in the long run as it builds that personal relationship with your readers. Caitlin Gustafson is an Online PR Specialist for Web Talent Marketing with a focus on content marketing and social media. You can find her blogging and tweeting about her two favorite things: digital marketing and travel. Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger How Compassion International Uses Blogging to Save Lives

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ProBlogger: What does the ‘Pro’ in ProBlogger Stand for?

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What does the ‘Pro’ in ProBlogger Stand for? Posted: 19 Feb 2015 06:01 AM PST I overheard an interesting debate on Twitter recently about what the 'Pro' in ProBlogger stands for. Is it to signify professional behaviour, or is it about the profession of blogging? The answer is both – but in my mind it's more. Here's what the Pro in ProBlogger means to me I'm Pro Bloggers – I love bloggers As a 16-year-old I took a short course in public speaking. This was an unusual move for me because I was a very shy kid who had a small group of friends. The idea of speaking in front of a room of people terrified me, but as I wanted to conquer that fear I took the class. At the end of the course I had to stand up in front of a room of 60 or so people and talk for five minutes. I'd never felt such a rush of exhilaration and I saw people in the audience respond positively to my words and it triggered in me the beginning of a passion for communication. I've explored many forms of communication over the years but when I stumbled across blogs for the first time in 2002 I knew I'd found something special. What other tool could amplify the voice of an ordinar guy like me around the world to millions of people? I love blogging and I love bloggers and what they do day in and day out with their blogs. This blog is written by bloggers for bloggers and my hope is that it'll help them to step closer to their potential. It's about the Profession of Blogging For the first 18 or so months of my blogging, I didn't consider the idea that it could be anything but a hobby. That changed through a series of events including starting a little digital camera review blog and stumbling across the brand new Google AdSense ad network. To cut a long story short I began to experiment with making a little money from my blogs with the hope of covering my server costs and with the dream of one day being able to make enough money to get off dial-up internet and onto broadband. Gradually I made enough to do both those things and the income grew into the equivalent of a part time income. At this point I created a category on my personal blog for 'blog tips' and began sharing what I was learning. My income continued to grow until I reached a point in late 2004 where I realised I was going to have a full time income from blogging and that it had the potential to be my career or profession. I began to search for other full time bloggers and found very few writing about their experience so decided to start a blog on my journey to 'go pro' as a blogger. ProBlogger.net was born and I imported all my previously written blog tips from my personal blog over to start it in September 2004. I can't lay claim to inventing the term as someone had already registered ProBlogger.com (which I later bought). They were not really using the domain (but seemed to have plans to develop a blogging platform) and as far as I know, I was the first person to use the term to describe someone making a living from blogging. The early days of the blog were simply me sharing my journey of making a living from blogging. I wrote more general blog tips but the focus was always upon helping bloggers to sustain writing about their passions by building profitable blogs. It's about Positive Blogging I'm a glass half full kind of guy (most of the time) and was brought up by parents who taught me to always look for the positives in situations I face, and in the people around me. Similarly, a phrase that was often heard in our house was 'if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all'. This has all rubbed off on me and the way that I blog and I'm a big believer in spending 99% of my time doing things that are constructive and positive rather than focusing upon negativity, controversy, or picking out the fault in others. I've seen many blogs about blogging come and go over the years but have noticed one type of blog tips blog 'go' (or die) more often than others – that being the type that dwells of the negative more often than the positive. A number of examples come to mind (that I won't name) but all of which either focused upon critiquing the approach of others, causing division, stirring up controversy, and basically attempting to get traffic by causing trouble. While in some cases the negative tactic worked in getting eyeballs, each of these blogs is inactive today, and conversations with several of the bloggers concerned revealed that they couldn't sustain the negativity and ended up burning out. They also reflected to me that because they blogged negatively that they drew around them negative readers, and while traffic often rose so did a brand that they didn’t really want to be associated with in the long term. In my experience, a blogger sets the tone for their blog. If you blog with a negative stance you tend to create a culture of negativity that others pick up on and join in on. This is why some blogs end with with a cesspool of negativity in their comments. On the flip side if a blogger models constructive and positive blogging this can help with building a strong positive and constructive community of readers. While there will may be times to call out bad behaviour, write a justified rant, or offer a critique, my hope for ProBlogger is that it is a place for positive and constructive advice that brings about lasting change for those who read it. It's about blogging Professionally My hope with ProBlogger is that it is not only a blog that helps others to 'Go Pro' as bloggers, but that it inspires them to do so in a professional and ethical manner. A few years ago at a business conference I met a small group of attendees at a networking session, and on mentioning what I did, one of the members of the group burst out with the statement "but all you bloggers are scammers and sleaze bags!" I'll never forget that moment and the anger that the gentleman spoke with. After an awkward silence for a few seconds, he shared his story. It wasn't a pleasant one. Sadly he'd been ripped off by a blogger who claimed to be able to teach him how to make a fortune from blogging with his $3000 'program'. The program turned out to be a poorly curated collection of posts from ProBlogger and several other blogging tips blogs and the promised coaching and support never eventuated. Unfortunately this is not an isolated story, and one of the difficult parts about blogging about making money blogging is that the unprofessional and unethical actions of a small few bloggers in this niche hurt the reputation of the rest of us. ProBlogger has no $3000 programs and makes no promises of overnight riches from blogging. Making money from blogs generally takes a long term approach and a lot of good, old-fashioned hard work. While the temptation to take short cuts through unethical 'black hat' behaviour exist, the reality is that doing so puts you at the risk of being caught out and having your reputation hurt. My goal with ProBlogger is to create a site that helps bloggers to blog well about what they're passionate about, to build business models around their blogs to help them sustain what they do, and to do it in a professional and ethical way. Originally at: Blog Tips at ProBlogger What does the 'Pro' in ProBlogger Stand for?

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